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The Commons voted in favour of a new runway at Heathrow by 415 votes to 119. Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, who had previously promised to lie in front of the bulldozers, absented himself from the vote, instead meeting the Deputy Foreign Minister of Afghanistan in Kabul. ‘My resignation would have achieved absolutely nothing,’ he said. Greg Hands resigned as trade minister because he opposed the runway. The Scottish government said it still supported the runway even though SNP MPs at Westminster abstained. Spanish-owned Ferrovial, which operates Heathrow, is to move its international headquarters from Britain to Amsterdam because of Brexit. Friends of Gavin Williamson, the Defence Secretary, denied he had threatened to topple the Prime Minister unless defence spending was increased. After a meeting between the two, Theresa May had refused to say that Britain would remain a ‘tier one’ power. Liz Truss, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, said during a speech she made at the London School of Economics: ‘It is not macho just to demand more money.’ Dozens of houses were evacuated as fire spread across Saddleworth Moor on the outskirts of Manchester.
The EU Withdrawal Bill became law but the cabinet remained bafflingly divided over Brexit. At an event for EU diplomats in London, Boris Johnson, asked about corporate anxieties over a so-called hard Brexit, was reported to have said: ‘Fuck business.’ Airbus had said that it could cease operations in Britain entirely if there was no deal. Scotland’s biggest abattoir halted operations because of a shortage of carbon dioxide to stun pigs; supplies of keg beer for World Cup football fans were also affected. The government had stern words for fat children, half of whom it plans to do away with by 2030.
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